From Newsgroup: alt.sys.pdp11

Greetings, Usenet.

I'm a member of the Australian Computer Museum Society (ACMS), and we're trying to set up an 11/24 for dumping tapes and disk packs. The plan is
to run ULTRIX-11 V3.1 from a ZuluSCSI emulating a (huge) RA81 on an
Emulex UC18 MSCP SCSI controller, and then dump the media to that.

At the moment, there is also a TS11 controller in the machine, and we
want ideally to have RK05 and RP06 controllers too.

Unfortunately, we haven't been having much success so far. The CPU won't
come out of halt properly, and we appear to lose bus continuity.

Either something is broken, or there is a configuration issue. Several
of the cards have to be installed installed in a slot with the NPG
jumper removed. The machine has "DMA slots", which I take (though I may
very likely be wrong) to mean slots where this has been done.

Before we started, the machine was booting RT-11 from an RL02 pack just
fine. After failing to make the new configuration work, we attempted to
return it to its original configuration, and it will no longer boot
RT-11 from the same RL02 pack. It is possible that the pack has become damaged. When we try to boot it, the "PROC" light flashes slowly.

There is not much clearance between the cards, which have bits of
cardboard document folders between them for insulation. We did let out
some magic smoke when trying to make the new configuration work, and I
fear we may have damaged something.

I am posting here just in case there is something obvious preventing it
from working. I'm the software guy on this project, and I don't know
much about PDP-11 hardware, so my description of the problem is based on
what I have seen and heard.

I only have access to the machine once or twice a week, so don't expect
prompt responses.

Thanks in advance for any advice you may be able to provide.
--
Robert Chippendale
Sent from Mozilla Thunderbird

--- Synchronet 3.21f-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: alt.sys.pdp11

On 25/4/26 16:52, Robert Chippendale wrote:

Greetings, Usenet.

I'm a member of the Australian Computer Museum Society (ACMS), and we're trying to set up an 11/24 for dumping tapes and disk packs. The plan is
to run ULTRIX-11 V3.1 from a ZuluSCSI emulating a (huge) RA81 on an
Emulex UC18 MSCP SCSI controller, and then dump the media to that.

At the moment, there is also a TS11 controller in the machine, and we
want ideally to have RK05 and RP06 controllers too.

Unfortunately, we haven't been having much success so far. The CPU won't come out of halt properly, and we appear to lose bus continuity.

Either something is broken, or there is a configuration issue. Several
of the cards have to be installed installed in a slot with the NPG
jumper removed. The machine has "DMA slots", which I take (though I may
very likely be wrong) to mean slots where this has been done.

Before we started, the machine was booting RT-11 from an RL02 pack just fine. After failing to make the new configuration work, we attempted to return it to its original configuration, and it will no longer boot
RT-11 from the same RL02 pack. It is possible that the pack has become damaged. When we try to boot it, the "PROC" light flashes slowly.

There is not much clearance between the cards, which have bits of
cardboard document folders between them for insulation. We did let out
some magic smoke when trying to make the new configuration work, and I
fear we may have damaged something.

I am posting here just in case there is something obvious preventing it
from working. I'm the software guy on this project, and I don't know
much about PDP-11 hardware, so my description of the problem is based on what I have seen and heard.

I only have access to the machine once or twice a week, so don't expect prompt responses.

Thanks in advance for any advice you may be able to provide.

Update: after replacing the RL02's ribbon cable, we are able to boot
RT-11 from an RL02 pack on the machine in its original configuration. So
the 11/24 itself works.

We have not made any progress on making the new configuration work. It
seems to me that we have either bad hardware, bad configuration, or
(more than likely) a combination of the two.
--
Robert Chippendale
Sent from Mozilla Thunderbird
--- Synchronet 3.21f-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: alt.sys.pdp11

On 25/4/26 17:36, Robert Chippendale wrote:

On 25/4/26 16:52, Robert Chippendale wrote:

Greetings, Usenet.

I'm a member of the Australian Computer Museum Society (ACMS), and
we're trying to set up an 11/24 for dumping tapes and disk packs. The
plan is to run ULTRIX-11 V3.1 from a ZuluSCSI emulating a (huge) RA81
on an Emulex UC18 MSCP SCSI controller, and then dump the media to that.

At the moment, there is also a TS11 controller in the machine, and we
want ideally to have RK05 and RP06 controllers too.

Unfortunately, we haven't been having much success so far. The CPU
won't come out of halt properly, and we appear to lose bus continuity.

Either something is broken, or there is a configuration issue. Several
of the cards have to be installed installed in a slot with the NPG
jumper removed. The machine has "DMA slots", which I take (though I
may very likely be wrong) to mean slots where this has been done.

Before we started, the machine was booting RT-11 from an RL02 pack
just fine. After failing to make the new configuration work, we
attempted to return it to its original configuration, and it will no
longer boot RT-11 from the same RL02 pack. It is possible that the
pack has become damaged. When we try to boot it, the "PROC" light
flashes slowly.

There is not much clearance between the cards, which have bits of
cardboard document folders between them for insulation. We did let out
some magic smoke when trying to make the new configuration work, and I
fear we may have damaged something.

I am posting here just in case there is something obvious preventing
it from working. I'm the software guy on this project, and I don't
know much about PDP-11 hardware, so my description of the problem is
based on what I have seen and heard.

I only have access to the machine once or twice a week, so don't
expect prompt responses.

Thanks in advance for any advice you may be able to provide.

Update: after replacing the RL02's ribbon cable, we are able to boot
RT-11 from an RL02 pack on the machine in its original configuration. So
the 11/24 itself works.

We have not made any progress on making the new configuration work. It
seems to me that we have either bad hardware, bad configuration, or
(more than likely) a combination of the two.

Here is a further update written by the other person working on this
project (also the president of the ACMS):

To elaborate from the above- I am working on this project as well.

We ended up finding the RL02 ribbon cable failed during our reseating of cards and the unit is back to running RT11 from an RL02.

The issue is now the Emulex UC18 SCSI card and settings and compatibility.

When itrCOs installed in a slot (7) the unit either doesnrCOt run the processor or is stuck in halt. (@ command or nothing at all)

Trying to understand if it will work straight in a PDP-11/24 with a stock M9312 boot card or if we have to do something to the unit to allow it to work.

Jumpers are all default and the Slot its in was previously a DMA (M7819 card) which apparently will have the NPG set correctly.

ThererCOs the other thought - having plugged these into a QBUS machine in the past- can they have been damaged? We didnrCOt realise they were Unibus initially due to the UC-18 and UC-08 being so much the same

Are they just bad cards? One did lose a bus transceiver on plugging it in for testing.

This has been copied from a thread on the society's Web forum at https://forum.acms.org.au/t/problems-in-setting-up-an-11-24-for-dumping/890
--
Robert Chippendale
Sent from Mozilla Thunderbird
--- Synchronet 3.21f-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: alt.sys.pdp11

On 4/24/26 11:52 PM, Robert Chippendale wrote:

Greetings, Usenet.

I'm a member of the Australian Computer Museum Society (ACMS), and we're trying to set up an 11/24 for dumping tapes and disk packs.

Using vintage hardware for magtape recovery is generally a bad idea.
Be prepared to do a lot of evaluation / baking / lubrication on any media you attempt to recover.

My current process is shown in https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-xlq_MPWNKk


--- Synchronet 3.21f-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: alt.sys.pdp11

On 25/4/26 21:03, Robert Chippendale wrote:

On 25/4/26 17:36, Robert Chippendale wrote:

On 25/4/26 16:52, Robert Chippendale wrote:

Greetings, Usenet.

I'm a member of the Australian Computer Museum Society (ACMS), and
we're trying to set up an 11/24 for dumping tapes and disk packs. The
plan is to run ULTRIX-11 V3.1 from a ZuluSCSI emulating a (huge) RA81
on an Emulex UC18 MSCP SCSI controller, and then dump the media to that. >>>
At the moment, there is also a TS11 controller in the machine, and we
want ideally to have RK05 and RP06 controllers too.

Unfortunately, we haven't been having much success so far. The CPU
won't come out of halt properly, and we appear to lose bus continuity.

Either something is broken, or there is a configuration issue.
Several of the cards have to be installed installed in a slot with
the NPG jumper removed. The machine has "DMA slots", which I take
(though I may very likely be wrong) to mean slots where this has been
done.

Before we started, the machine was booting RT-11 from an RL02 pack
just fine. After failing to make the new configuration work, we
attempted to return it to its original configuration, and it will no
longer boot RT-11 from the same RL02 pack. It is possible that the
pack has become damaged. When we try to boot it, the "PROC" light
flashes slowly.

There is not much clearance between the cards, which have bits of
cardboard document folders between them for insulation. We did let
out some magic smoke when trying to make the new configuration work,
and I fear we may have damaged something.

I am posting here just in case there is something obvious preventing
it from working. I'm the software guy on this project, and I don't
know much about PDP-11 hardware, so my description of the problem is
based on what I have seen and heard.

I only have access to the machine once or twice a week, so don't
expect prompt responses.

Thanks in advance for any advice you may be able to provide.

Update: after replacing the RL02's ribbon cable, we are able to boot
RT-11 from an RL02 pack on the machine in its original configuration.
So the 11/24 itself works.

We have not made any progress on making the new configuration work. It
seems to me that we have either bad hardware, bad configuration, or
(more than likely) a combination of the two.

Here is a further update written by the other person working on this
project (also the president of the ACMS):

To elaborate from the above- I am working on this project as well.

We ended up finding the RL02 ribbon cable failed during our reseating
of cards and the unit is back to running RT11 from an RL02.

The issue is now the Emulex UC18 SCSI card and settings and
compatibility.

When itrCOs installed in a slot (7) the unit either doesnrCOt run the
processor or is stuck in halt. (@ command or nothing at all)

Trying to understand if it will work straight in a PDP-11/24 with a
stock M9312 boot card or if we have to do something to the unit to
allow it to work.

Jumpers are all default and the Slot its in was previously a DMA
(M7819 card) which apparently will have the NPG set correctly.

ThererCOs the other thought - having plugged these into a QBUS machine
in the past- can they have been damaged? We didnrCOt realise they were
Unibus initially due to the UC-18 and UC-08 being so much the same

Are they just bad cards? One did lose a bus transceiver on plugging it
in for testing.

This has been copied from a thread on the society's Web forum at https://forum.acms.org.au/t/problems-in-setting-up-an-11-24-for-dumping/890

Yet another update: after posting on Facebook, we have discovered we
were plugging the UC18s into the wrong half of the slot. At least one of
them has a fried bus transceiver, which should be replaceable. Hopefully (fingers crossed) we should be able to make one work soon now.
--
Robert Chippendale
Sent from Mozilla Thunderbird
--- Synchronet 3.21f-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: alt.sys.pdp11

Using vintage hardware for magtape recovery is generally a bad idea.
Be prepared to do a lot of evaluation / baking / lubrication on any
media you attempt to recover.

To flush that warning out a little, be aware that you may only get one
read pass on any given piece of media. Using vintage harware adds a lot
of uncertainty and potential failures to the process, potentially
invalidating initial attempts to read.

De
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